David J. McClaskey

President, Business Excellence Institute

David McClaskey is an independent consultant, Baldrige expert and one of the few individuals to have the privilege of assisting seven companies to win eight Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Awards (about 10% of the total winners):K&N Management (2010); Poudre Valley Health Care (2008); University of Northern Colorado Monfort College of Business (2004 winner); Pal’s Sudden Service (2001 winner); OMI (2000 winner); The Ritz-Carlton Hotel Company (1999 and 1992 winner); and Eastman Chemical Company (1993 winner). His Baldrige track record is at 100% for companies that have worked with David for 2 years or longer. He also assisted one company, Florida Power and Light, to be the first company outside of Japan to win Japan’s National Quality Award, the Deming Prize. He has assisted 3 companies to win 4 Level 4 Excellence Awards (highest level) of the Tennessee Center for Performance Excellence Award as well as assisted companies to win Baldrige-based State quality awards in Texas, Colorado, Mississippi, and Arkansas. David served as one of nine Judges for the Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award from 1999-2002. This is the panel of experts, appointed by the Secretary of Commerce, which selects the national Baldrige winners. In addition to having served as a Baldrige Judge, he has also served as a Judge for the Tennessee Quality Award (1993-1998; 2004-2009) a Judge for the State of Georgia Quality Award (1998-2003) and a Baldrige Examiner. David developed and taught the initial three-day Examiner Preparation courses for both the Tennessee Quality Award (1993) and the Arkansas Quality Award (1995).

David is co-founder in 2000 (with Thom Crosby) and President of Pal’s Business Excellence Institute (BEI). Each year hundreds of leaders and managers from all types of businesses come to Kingsport from all over the country and Canada. They learn from BEI how to improve their organizations based on Pal’s Baldrige-based, world-class performance excellence practices and see one of the best managed companies in the country. Pal’s is a company that integrates and applies all 7 Baldrige Categories at an excellent level and gets excellent sustained business results. Healthcare organizations represented about 50% of the BEI participates over the last year.

As a consultant, David works with all types and sizes of organizations including health care, service, small businesses, government, manufacturing, education, and non-profit organizations and companies. He helps them use Baldrige, Excellence in Execution, Lean, Customer Service, Lean Six Sigma, Strategic Planning, and other performance management tools to sustainably improve their management, work processes and results. Some of the organizations include: Poudre Valley Health System; Pal’s Sudden Service, Veterans Health Administration (national, VA Mountain Home, TN Valley Healthcare System, and VISNs 9 and 20); Bristol TN Essential Services; RPM Pizza (largest Domino’s Pizza franchisee), The Restaurant Company (highest rated Arby’s franchisee); AT&T; City of Kingsport; Scott County Virginia,South Carolina State Government; U.S. Navy; United Way of Greater Kingsport; Sullivan County School Board; John Deere Health Care; Eastman Kodak; University of Northern Colorado; University of Tennessee; University of Florida; and Poudre School District. David is a national instructor for the American Society for Quality (ASQ). He co-developed and teaches ASQ’s, 5-day “Introduction to Quality Management” course that is offered nationally. David is a Master Six Sigma Black Belt.

Prior to 2007, in addition to doing consulting, David worked for the 1993 Baldrige Award winning Eastman Chemical Company for 34 years as an internal Performance Excellence Consultant. He was responsible for helping Eastman use Quality Management and Six Sigma to get results. David trained their Six Sigma Black Belts and Green Belts, specializing in Belts that worked on service, HR and supply chain projects.

David played a key role in Baldrige history in 1988, when he was asked by the U.S. government to design and deliver the training for the very first Baldrige Board of Examiners, and thus became the first Baldrige trainer. At that time, David developed a lot of the Baldrige assessment, scoring, and training protocol that is still used today. He was a “leading contributor” to improvements in the 1989-91 Baldrige criteria. Since 1988, David helps companies use Baldrige to improve to levels where they are Award winners at State and National levels. He has taught over 5,000 leaders, in the U.S. and internationally, how to understand and use the Baldrige criteria to improve.

Some of David’s recognitions include: 1998 recipient of ASQ’s prestigious international E. L. Grant Award for the development and presentation of meritorious educational programs in quality management; 1993, Distinguished Service Award from the University of Florida’s College of Engineering; 1989, Certificate of Appreciation from the U.S. Department of Commerce for “outstanding service to the nation”.

David is a Fellow of both ASQ and the Institute of Industrial Engineers (IIE). He is an ASQ-certified Quality Manager, Quality Engineer, Six Sigma Black Belt, and Quality Improvement Associate; is a licensed Professional Engineer; and has a Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees in Industrial Engineering from the University of Florida and the University of Tennessee. The University of Florida established the Leavenworth/McClaskey undergraduate scholarship in 1995.

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